


who but my lady greensleeves

by kafkas



Category: Kuroshitsuji | Black Butler
Genre: Eldritch Abominations, F/F, Gender Roles, Implied/Referenced Abuse, Menstruation, Rule 63, Unhealthy Relationships, Victorian Attitudes
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-03-11
Updated: 2018-03-11
Packaged: 2019-03-29 11:48:31
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Major Character Death, Underage
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,338
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/13926537
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/kafkas/pseuds/kafkas
Summary: ‘You’re so kind, Cee. To take these people in. Truly.’Beyond the rotunda, Sébastienne was clipping roses for a floral arrangement. Briefly, she met Celia’s gaze, her smile pinched in an attempt to mask her amusement.‘The novelty,’ Celia gritted, ‘wears thin.’or, Lady Celia Phantomhive sees it fit to employ a paid companion.





	who but my lady greensleeves

**Author's Note:**

> \- Title is from _Greensleeves_ , obviously   
> \- Nothing particularly untoward happens between Celia and Sébastienne, though I felt it necessary to tag anyway (especially since this fic references Celia's past sexual abuse at the hands of the cult)  
> 

 

**i.**

‘But she’s so exquisite! Are you sure she’s not some runaway heiress?’

‘I quite assure you, Lizzie, that I picked her up off the streets in Saint Pancras where she was begging for scraps. Fallen women – London goes through them by the sack-full.’

Sentimental tears. Beneath the lace-iron table, Elizabeth pressed her hand. ‘You’re so kind, Cee. To take these people in. Truly.’

Beyond the rotunda, Sébastienne was clipping roses for a floral arrangement. Briefly, she met Celia’s gaze, her smile pinched in an attempt to mask her amusement.

‘The novelty,’ Celia gritted, ‘wears thin.’

 

 

**ii.**

Lawyers had for some time endeavored to transfer ownership of the estate to the Midfords, a prospect Lord Alexis, who outranked Celia, was not entirely opposed to. His desires were unselfish – more than anything, he wished to unburden his poor niece; the thought of her living alone in that somber old house with only the servants for company unsettled him greatly.

However, a combination of quiet equivocation from Celia, Francis’ stern distaste for her late brother’s line of work, and a particularly disquieting visit from Her Majesty’s chief aide had dissuaded him from pressing the issue any further.

‘Lady Phantomhive is in perfectly sound hands,’ Landers had soothed, though Alexis had felt distinctly as though he were being threatened. ‘A trial would only intensify her suffering. It would be best for everyone involved if his lordship simply laid the matter to rest.’

 _Or I’ll lay you to rest_ , the aide seemed to say, as he smiled at Alexis over the rim of his teacup. An exceptionally handsome fellow, in all his silver livery, yet in much the same way a frozen channel could be crossed in relative safety, one couldn’t help but think of all that black water coursing beneath the surface.

Alexis had conceded quietly.

 

 

**iii.**

They had, after some deliberation, settled on the term _companion_. Celia was by all accounts too old to still be employing a governess (though the demon would teach her, nonetheless), and a position as housekeeper would require her newfound protector to remain at the estate while the between staff travelled to London (though the demon would attend to those duties, too).

Seated in the estate office, Sébastienne had smiled graciously, inclining her head. ‘My mistress is most generous.’ There was some pleasure to be had at the prospect of dining separately from Finny, Bardroy, and Meirin.

Celia resented her cheer. ‘Generosity has nothing to do with it.’ A listing as paid companion would simply grant the demon unfettered access to her person without arousing any undue suspicion. It was a purely preemptive decision.

‘It will also, I should think, garner you some sympathy from the public.’

‘What ever do you mean?’

Sébastienne’s fingers were laced together atop her skirts, her expression perfectly demure. ‘After what you’ve been through, my lady, why should you ever wish to travel alone?’

Celia, having paced the length of the room, at last came to rest before her protector.  

‘I am not frightened of them, Sébastienne.’

‘No, of course not. Better they think you are, though.’ Idly, the demon clasped her small, soft hand. A sisterly gesture she’d doubtless mimicked before. Celia let her get away with it because – well, it was learning, wasn’t it?

‘ _Look like the innocent flower_ ,’ Sébastienne murmured, more to herself than to her charge, ‘ _but be the serpent under’t_.’

 

 

 

**iv.**

They were, of course, utterly taken in by her. Initial suspicions – her French name, her mysterious origins – were quickly overcome, and soon it was as if there was a proper lady of the house once more. Albeit, she was a touch more exacting than darling, tender Rachel had been – her decorous expression, when it frayed at the edges, seemed to hint at something wrathful kept tempered.

Her habit, too, left a lot to be desired. Where the late mistress’s crinoline and fine lace _engageantes_ had been the delight of the maid staff, Celia’s companion dressed simply and austerely, in bell skirts and tailored jackets. When performing strenuous tasks, she would strip down to her shirtwaist, a sight that often sent Bardroy and Finny blushing from the room. Meirin was forever envious of her sleek, dark hair, which she wore in a severe plait and forever refused to do anything at all adventurous with. Once, Celia had caught her in her nightgown, and even that hung off of her like a uniform.

There was simply nothing womanly about Sébastienne. It was uniquely irritating, for as Celia matured it seemed she was destined to asphyxiate beneath a pile of frills and drapery. Lau – damnable Lau, who still treated her as if she were a toddler and insisted on showering her with inane trinkets – had suggested casually one day that she might like to borrow one of Ran-Mao’s _cheongsams_ , and, anything being better than another hoop skirt, she’d almost acquiesced.

‘Men are indolent,’ Sébastienne had muttered, later that evening, nimble fingers making quick work of Celia’s newest corset, ‘I wouldn’t listen to your little friend, if I were you. Modesty if of no use to men like him, but to those such as yourself, it is everything.’

‘When we first met, you were stark naked and covered in gore like some kind of harpy. Should you really be the one espousing the benefits of modesty?’

A low chuckle. Sébastienne’s skirts whispered across the carpet as she bent to unhook Celia’s busque. ‘I simply meant that to withhold a thing is to bear in sway those who might wish to possess it.’

‘Is that what I do? Bear you in sway?’

‘But of course.’ Gloved hands slid down Celia’s spine, over creamy satin sheathing, extravagantly embroidered, and beneath it, the occultists’ brand. A kind of pecoran stillness settled over her charge, a shivering anticipation. ‘Such lovely packaging,’ Sébastienne murmured, and her voice was garbled slightly, flush with salvia, ‘who could possibly bear to rend it?’

 

 

 

**v.**

Celia had been in just this sort of situation before – the dark, the cage, the copper smell of blood. Her demon’s true form, boundless, depthless; a charybdis, shrieking and moaning, the full force of the maelstrom lashing the bare skin of her face. This was the creature that shared her hotel suites, that brought her the morning paper on a silver platter every morning. The creature that, just that evening, had brushed out her hair in long, even strokes before the vanity mirror.

Somewhere in the shadows of the gallery, she could hear the Viscount Druitt babbling senselessly, clawing at the walls in his attempts to escape.

‘May I have my fun with him, mistress?’ Sébastienne’s voice was like warped metal, its echo fading before rising again to an excruciating pitch. Thinking of Druitt’s fingers spidering over her waist, Celia was almost tempted to allow it. But –

If she was not kind, then she was, at least, practical. It was going to be difficult enough to explain a room full of corpses. Lobotomizing Druitt would only complicate things.

‘You may not,’ she murmured, and in the thrumming darkness she was sure she heard a grumble of disapproval.

‘Very well.’ Suddenly, Celia’s vision cleared, and she found herself cradled in Sébastienne’s arms, with no notion of how she came to be there. The hair that had come loose from its fastenings tickled Celia’s cheek. The heart that beat against her cheek was steady, human. Only the fingers, perhaps, were too tapered, their tips blackened as if by fire. When Celia glanced up, there were entirely too many teeth protruding between her companion’s lips.

‘For god’s sake, Sébastienne, show some propriety, would you?’

‘Apologies, mistress.’ A shake of the head, a wet crack, and Sébastienne’s jaw popped back into place. She smiled down at Celia charmingly, like the cameo portrait she wore pinned to her collar. Celia resisted the urge to shudder.

‘Lord, you’re incorrigible.’

 

 

 

**vi.**

It was not always so simple.

‘Show me again.’

‘Mistress?’

Celia – her skin a sallow grey, as it always was when she awakened from a nightmare, eyes as round as saucers peering out from beneath her coverlet. ‘Show me, so that I might see what they saw.’

Sébastienne was reticent. ‘For her ladyship to look upon me in such a state, it would be – improper.’

‘This is my house, Sébastienne, and I will decide what is and is not proper. Now, I order you: cast off your disguise.’

The effect was heady, though not nearly as overwhelming as it had been beneath Druitt’s drawing room. The heat, astringent with the scent of sulfur, lay still – it did not tug at Celia as if it wished to tear her limb from limb. The shadows likewise kept to themselves, a black mass throbbing at the foot of Celia’s bed, distinguishable from the darkness only in that the candlelight did not penetrate it.

Cautiously, Celia crawled forward, even if the effect was somewhat like crouching before an open furnace. As she peered through the gloom, a bloody gash opened before her eyes, red and dripping. It took the girl a moment to realize that it was a mouth, smiling malignantly.

‘Does this please you?’ Sébastienne intoned.

Celia, clambering to her feet atop the mattress, inclined her head. ‘Very much so.’

A discordant sound, like the awful clattering of silverware, greeted her words. Laughter, Celia suspected, though she could not be sure. Everything Sébastienne uttered in this form to her resembled only hunger.

Boldly, she reached up, caressing the snarled muzzle, feeling the hot, acrid rush of breath against her palm. Incisors the size of mammothine tusks gleamed wetly in the darkness, and, carefully, she wrapped her fingers around one of them, feeling the deep grooves in the enamel. With her other hand she stroked downwards, along the rumbling throat, the plated breast.

‘Mistress…’ A warning tone. Celia stayed her hand. The many eyes that regarded her were slit crossways, like a goat’s, and all seemed to have a life of their own, blinking spasmodically.

‘Am I making you uncomfortable?’

Another hot puff of air. ‘You are – tempting me. Beyond what it wise.’

‘Then you would do well to restrain yourself, demon,’ Celia jibed, and with both hands stretched upwards to grasp the horns that corkscrewed from Sébastienne’s temples.

The creature groaned, a terrible, wounded bellow.

‘Come now,’ Celia admonished, ‘I hope you are not always this sensitive.’

‘Please –’ a rare delight, to hear such a word from that maw, ‘Please, mistress, if you would relinquish your orders –’

‘Shan’t,’ Celia sniffed, ‘You’re to stay like this for the remainder of the evening, until I fall asleep.’

With a reptilian hiss, Sébastienne conceded, the darkness seeming to shrink about her minimally – a folding of the wings, perhaps? Smiling contentedly, Celia reclined against her companion’s hulking brow, burying her fingers in the plush down above her shoulder blades. A rough-napped tongue came out to lave at her bare feet, the sensation not entirely unpleasant – a disobedient dog, begging for forgiveness.

‘Do I frighten you, Sébastienne?’

The demon shook its head, inky fur brushing against Celia’s stomach. ‘You puzzle me.’ A shutter of the eyelids, and Sébastienne too seemed to sink into a half-sleep. ‘It is… much worse.’

 

 

**vii.**

‘There will of course come a time when you are required to marry.’ The Queen spoke, as always, as if she were addressing a beloved granddaughter. In many ways, Celia reminded her of her third daughter, Helena – viciously devoted, a little pit-bull of a girl. And as with all of her children, it pained her greatly to see the child age so bitterly.

Celia, stunned, shifted her attention to Landers, the Queen’s pale shadow, who was watching the proceedings with a detached, faintly amused expression.

‘Your Majesty?’

‘The Viscount Druitt is quite taken with you, I hear.’

Celia, despite her best efforts, visibly recoiled. ‘That bounder? You can’t be serious. To marry a common criminal would be to disgrace the Phantomhive name.’

Beneath her veil, the Queen tittered. ‘Quite right, dear girl. An ill-timed joke.’

‘Her Majesty is in a lively mood today,’ Landers offered, he, too, laughing.

‘Ah.’ Celia summoned up a wobbly smile. ‘I see.’

‘So, Edward Midford it is, then.’

Once more, Celia felt her stomach drop. ‘E-excuse me?’

‘Edward Midford,’ the Queen repeated, ‘I take it you two _are_ acquainted with each other?’

Celia lowered her head. ‘Yes, our families are long-standing friends.’

A muffled clap as the Queen clasped her gloved hands together fiercely. ‘Excellent! Then that settles it! Ash, please escort Lady Phantomhive to her carriage.’

As Landers bid her to rise from her seat, Celia gaped like a dying fish. How to explain to the Grandmother of Europe that Edward reviled her? And she him? That for the last three years, Celia has been hopelessly devoted to his little sister – so devoted, in fact, that Edward had on occasion deemed her an invert, and bid her to keep her distance?

Such a mournful household. A sister grieving her brother, her daughter her fiancé.

Elizabeth adored Celia, but she had _loved_ Ciel. It pained her inordinately.

Rather, she would much prefer to stay put; tended to by her guileless servants, and old Tanaka, who knew better than to reopen old wounds; Sébastienne, who was a demon and naturally felt the temptation to do so, but refrained from it anyway – and wasn’t that a kind of love?

‘My lady,’ Landers whispered, and there was something gleeful about his gaze, ‘Might I suggest refraining from any further protestations, at least for the time being? Our glorious Mother, like any other human being, has always been susceptible to a change of heart.’

Celia nodded, dazedly, though on some level the phrasing registered as unnatural. As Landers helped her into the hansom, he clasped both her hands in his. His skin – satiny, almost intangible. ‘Take heart, Celia. A wedding is a blessed thing, after all.’

 _I do not_ , Celia thought, _intend to live to see the day._

 

 

**viii.**

At the drop of a hat, Sébastienne could: hem a gown; bake a beautiful _pâte feuilletée_ ; compose for violin and harpsichord; mix drinks; recite Baudelaire; sing a passable contralto; and excise a man’s spine from his body.

She could not – or rather, struggled with: long periods of quietude; Meirin’s overeager affections; the ozone smell of seraphs that seemed to accompany Ash Landers wherever he went; gauging the taste of human food; keeping her fangs in check; and mothering.  

It was just past midnight and Celia stood stock still beneath the doorframe, hands balled into fists at her sides. Sébastienne, not yet asleep – knitting a doily with one hand, balancing the account books with the other – braced herself for a telling off, though for what exactly she could not posit. Celia’s August supper – salmon and _chèvre_ with a pot of cool Indian ginseng – had been impeccable, and she’d been sure to strip back the duvet in the event that her charge grew too warm.

Peering at Celia through the near-dark, it then became clearer to Sébastienne that the girl was not angry at all, but shame-faced.

‘There’s – blood,’ she’d mumbled, so softly Sébastienne might not have heard her were it not for her superior senses.

‘Blood, my lady?’

‘Yes, _blood_ ,’ Celia hissed, her cheeks burning. A searching moment passed, Sébastienne staring at her bemusedly, and then she groaned, bunching her skirts. ‘My chemise, you nitwit. I soiled it.’

‘Soiled? But how could you –’ Abruptly, Sébastienne stopped her mouth, almost embarrassed. ‘Oh.’

‘Well, don’t just sit there, _help me_ ,’ Celia gritted.  

Her companion slid smoothly to her feet. ‘Of course, my lady.’

Celia had grumbled as she was led to her bedroom, and tapped her foot impatiently while she waited for Sébastienne to draw her bath.

‘You mightn’t have worn your nightgown.’

‘I apologize, my lady. Would you like me to go back downstairs and change?’

‘No, just – hurry up.’

It was only as her sleeping clothes were being lifted over her head that her charge fell suddenly silent, a look of dour contemplation settling over her countenance. Sébastienne knew the expression well, just as she knew Celia was more likely to turn inward when she was upset than to throw a tantrum, as any other child her age might be expected to do.

‘The late Lady Phantomhive – she explained all of this to you, I assume? Before the incident?’

Celia nodded minutely. Her hands, crossed protectively over her bare stomach, were still balled into fists. Sébastienne gently removed her eye-patch, setting it atop the medicine counter.

‘Just think what might have happened if Meirin had found you,’ she murmured, allowing herself a smirk, ‘Now, that would _truly_ be embarrassing.’

‘You’re not my mother, Sébastienne!’ Celia blurted, letting out a wet gasp.

Sébastienne blinked – once, twice – and then dropped her gaze. ‘Of course not, my lady. I am nothing if not your humble servant.’

‘Good.’ Celia spoke as much as if she were reassuring herself than as she was Sébastienne. ‘Good.’

 

 

**ix.**

A dry pressure at the base of her skull, tingling pain. Celia stirred as if woken from some deep sleep to find her wounds tended to, the smell of antiseptic heavy in the air. Sébastienne knelt before her on the carpet, a deep gash scything through the meat of her shoulder. She was, bizarrely, singing; face half-obscured as she hung her head, lips lacquered red with blood.

‘ _I have been ready at your hand,_

_To grant whatever you would crave_

_I have both wagered life and land,_

_Your love and goodwill for to have_ …’

‘I didn’t know you could sing,’ Celia croaked. She’d half wanted Sébastienne to startle, scrambling to her feet, but she only smiled up at Celia briefly before returning to the task at hand.

‘Young mistress was quite shell-shocked,’ her companion tutted, daubing with a cotton-ball at the cuts on her shins, ‘I feared we’d have to break out the smelling salts.’

‘Shell-shocked?’ Suddenly, it all came rushing back to her: the prostitute; the alley; that outlandish, lizard-toothed woman; Sébastienne bent beneath the rotating saw –

Abruptly, she choked, a hand flying to her mouth. ‘Auntie Anne.’

‘Yes,’ Sébastienne murmured, with grim finality, ‘Auntie Anne.’

Her companion continued to plaster her wounds in silence, and Celia couldn’t help but stare at the blood smattering her clean white gloves, the shredded fabric of her travelling coat.

‘I had thought –’ Celia paused, pursing her quivering lips.

‘My lady?’

_You shouldn’t have been born in the first place!_

Celia laughed, mordantly. ‘It’s nothing. Solidarity between women – what a load of hogwash.’

Sébastienne smiled again, though her gaze was doleful. ‘Perhaps you and she should have signed a contract.’

‘Perhaps.’ Celia pressed a palm to her forehead, closing her eyes. She was suddenly very tired, not just in body but in soul.

There was a click as Sébastienne snapped shut the first aid box, and then, a moment later, paper dry kisses to each of her eyelids, the center of her brow. Celia did not reprimand her companion for the breach of conduct. It was learning, after all.

 

 

**x.**

‘Why ‘Sébastienne’?’ It was not a question asked out of vanity.

In her hospital bed, Celia had emerged from her cocoon of blankets. Her hair, shorn off by her captors, had just begun to turn to peach-fuzz. Her voice, when she spoke, was still raw from screaming.

‘My doll.’ She coughed, dryly, and then clarified, ‘Ragdoll. Mother and father wouldn’t let me have a puppy.’

Sébastienne’s eyebrow twitched ever so slightly. ‘Your doll,’ she repeated.

‘Yes.’ Celia’s head, unbalanced atop her emaciated shoulders, lolled to regard her. Her lone eye, the other obscured by medical gauze, was hard and offered no compliance. ‘I used to dress her up. Father had the habits custom sewn.’

Sébastienne wrung her lambskin gloves in a strangle-hold, the leather creaking like old wood. Celia tracked the movement and smiled thinly.

‘Is this going to be a problem?’

Sébastienne's eyes, just for one moment, seemed to bulge to inhuman proportions, slit and glistening. Then, she swallowed, shaking her head. ‘No, mistress. It is quite charming.’

 

 

 

**Author's Note:**

> [♫](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Sx83owWT5Ck)


End file.
